Design, deconstruction, and development details of our indie RPG!

Tag Archives: Tales of Symphonia

It would be a little silly to give a regular update two days after my last one, so instead I’ll recap everything I’ve done and look forward toward what’s still to come.

What’s Done

* Stat growth balance – I based my stat growth and experience point scaling loosely on Pokémon as a familiar starting point, but altered to my own ends. Stats are slightly higher across the board to compensate for the absence of an EV system. (And no worries: there’s no IV equivalent! A character on her first playthrough will always grow to be exactly as strong as herself on her second.)

* Core battle mechanics – Damage formulas, status effects, passive abilities, elemental resistances, and pretty much anything in the foundation of the battle system does what I want from it!

* Move balance – Another thing I loosely based on Pokémon. As a marginally competitive Pokémon player, a decision between Icy Wind, Ice Beam, and Blizzard is one of the clearest examples of good game design, so I adapted their principles and it’s turned out great. I don’t feel like I have any filler moves, especially in conjunction with…

* Enemy AI and balance – Of the 42 enemies I’ve tossed in so far, I’m happy with at least 35 of them in terms of how they act and how weak or strong they are. Since most of the enemies recur across many continents at different levels—yet again, Pokémon inspiration—the important ones are all really solid. Most importantly, they feel distinct: ogres are vastly more threatening than kobold rogues, but kobold rogues are quite a bit more annoying. I’ve played entirely too many RPGs—even RPGs that are among my favorites of all time!—where enemies are interchangeable pretty models, which is right near the top of my list of things to avoid.

* Equipment system and fashion subsystem – Inspired by Dragon Quest IX, but a lot more visible, the way you wear your clothes can give you hundreds of possible fashion bonuses. What you can wear also depends on your body type; a character like Evelyn who has wings can wear wing accessories but not a cape or cloak.

* Equipment and status menu layouts – Granted that they’re only boxes and alignment right now since I haven’t paid for any art assets here, but I’m pretty satisfied with how cleanly they’re laid out.

* Controllable animated sprites – I just wrote about this, but yes, now the player can actually move a character sprite around and it’ll animate properly. <3 Like in Chrono Trigger or Final Fantasy VI, I’ll only do four directions of sprites, but diagonal movement is still possible. (FFVI had that on staircases in the Fanatics’ Tower and Zozo; I bring up the comparison because, for budget reasons, my sprites will look a lot more like that than huge CT sprites.)

* First continent layout – The first few (mini-)dungeons and one or two towns are still to come, but the main continent itself is all set up. I might increase or even double its size, but the layout’s not changing much if at all.

And, of course, I’ve written a myriad of flavor text and dialogue. But that’s not gameplay, so it doesn’t count. =P

Still Upcoming

* Battle timing – Although I’m making a turn-based RPG for several reasons beyond the scope of this post, action RPGs are technically my preferred genre, so I’ve been trying to figure out how to keep battles flowing. Multiple attacks per turn with a limited window for inputs like Valkyrie Profile? EarthBound style HP drain? Reduce the battle party size?

* The point of the fashion subsystem – Okay, so dressing great increases your Style stat, but what does that do? In DQIX it didn’t accomplish much pragmatically. Do I pull a Zelos from Tales of Symphonia and have NPCs throw goodies at you for looking fabulous? How about borrowing from Dragon’s Curse (AKA Wonder Boy III: Dragon’s Trap) and locking out some obtainable items until you look good enough to earn them? Should Style affect battles in a minor way like the Luck stat in Fire Emblem?

* Extra battle mechanics – Celty’s battle gameplay is… different from most of my other characters. Without giving away any spoilers past the first 10-15 minutes, she has a hero code and never uses overwhelming force against her enemies even if she significantly outlevels them, so her visible stats don’t reflect her real battle performance. I haven’t finalized figuring out how I’m going to accomplish that code-wise, but it’s vital—and not only from a story perspective! Everything I do goes to the good of gameplay somehow. Other than that, the one major aspect of battles that I didn’t get rolling yet is enemies who can summon allies or reinforcements, like greatwolves calling more of their pack or kobold chiefs calling underling warriors. I know it’s possible in ORK Framework since others say they’ve done it, so I only have to figure it out.

* Priority attacks – This, on the other hand, is impossible in ORK right now—at least as far as I can tell! Priority attacks are moves like Quick Attack in Pokémon or Mercurial Thrust in Dragon Quest that always attack first but are weak as well as moves like Dragon Tail that always attack last but have a notable effect. One option for me is to outright commission the development of that feature. Another is to try out a delayed priority effect; instead of an attack going first and dealing weak damage, it could deal weak damage and make the next turn’s attack go first. I can’t remember ever seeing that in an RPG, so I might give it a shot just to see how I like it. This sort of thing is a perfect example of limitations drawing out creativity. =)

* Animation integration – Just because I can animate sprites in a vacuum doesn’t mean I know yet how to integrate them with ORK. I think I do know! …but animation is the one and only thing so far that’s been more difficult than I anticipated, so I rule nothing out.

* Full-fledged environment movement – Player characters need to interact with the terrain and the camera needs to follow them, so for as much trouble as it was, simply getting a character moving is only a first step! …so to speak. =P

* Cutscenes – I haven’t even touched the idea of making cutscenes happen since they’re one of my lowest priorities, but they’re certainly coming up!

* Additional environments – Like I mentioned above, I’ll need a few dungeons and towns. (Don’t interpret that as tons of work; SNES classics often had one-room “dungeons” or “towns” like Guardia Forest and Gau’s father’s house to create scenery variety—and I’m certainly learning from that mold!)

And, of course, I’ll need art assets and music and so forth, but the bulk of those efforts will be on other people rather than me.

Final Words

I’m probably forgetting a few things that I’ve done and a few things that I still need to do, but overall this is a pretty good review of where I’ve been and where I’m going. Good to regain some perspective after a long challenge and a recent breakthrough. : D

Originally a script for a video review, so some parts may stick out and, without visual aids, I recommend having played the game already! Note: this is for the originalTales of Symphonia, so if anything changed in the re-release, I haven’t touched on it here.

23) Dual Duel Duet

In Meltokio we meet Sheena’s fellow ninja Kuchinawa and some scientists who agree to prepare a boat. The party stays a night at Zelos’ place, where Sheena gets flustered and embarrassed over Lloyd finding out that she likes flowers. Gotta give her that soft side. The next morning, Colette’s shoulder is stiff

FORESHADOWING

but the boat’s ready. They head to the docks where Colette sees the bridge for the first time

Note: Colette couldn’t see anything without her soul.

and calls it gross-looking and Zelos tells her that’s not an appropriate thing to say, even though he didn’t care the last time he saw it. Everyone also laughs at Lloyd for being uglier than The Great Zelos Wilder—I can’t make that up—and then they’re off.

His face loses out to mine, though.

You be the judge!

The boat can be shrunken and transported in a capsule like in Dragonball, which amazes Lloyd. …wait. If shrinking things into capsules is new technology to him, then Noishe can’t be—no. No, I’m done with that part. Not thinking about it anymore.

Before our next destination, the most interesting skit in the game pops up. I remembered it not showing until Flanoir, and even the official manga places it there, but if it can show up here too, let’s go. The Two Chosen skit! The only skit to make it into the sadly-rushed manga.

Originally a script for a video review, so some parts may stick out and, without visual aids, I recommend having played the game already! Note: this is for the originalTales of Symphonia, so if anything changed in the re-release, I haven’t touched on it here.

18) Plot Pretzel

Before we set off, Raine delivers the final dungeon disclaimer that there’s no guarantee they’ll return. She and Lloyd get the slow dragon and are last to arrive, while Martel and Kratos are already inside. The others move in and find Remiel, who explains that Martel will lose her heart and memory to become a true angel. Raine also knows a few new details. She promised Martel earlier not to say anything, but now reveals that she’ll die.

Oh, that Martel and her web of lies. To think Lloyd actually believed he found out the whole truth.

Originally a script for a video review, so some parts may stick out and, without visual aids, I recommend having played the game already! Note: this is for the originalTales of Symphonia, so if anything changed in the re-release, I haven’t touched on it here.

13) Where Optimism and Pessimism Converge

Everyone notices that Colette doesn’t feel pain from the wound she got for saving Lloyd’s sad self, so he spills the truth.

Becoming an angel means losing her humanity!

You’re phrasing this so negatively. She isn’t limited by pain, she’ll never fear starvation or be distracted by hunger, she can do anything she wants at any hour without being tired, and any pretty area would be a good vacation spot regardless of the climate, not to mention her ability to fly, her enhanced hearing, and her superior vision. What’s the problem?

Raine sets her second ranch to self-destruct mode and here comes another moral dilemma. I think. The party’s worried about Colette. Especially Lloyd, Genis, and Sheena—yeah, Sheena. Colette was right about her being a softy.

In fact, Sheena shows more sympathy than anyone else, though they all want her to stop the journey of world regeneration—but hold on. Let’s think about this.

First problem: Colette makes it pretty clear that she doesn’t care.

If Colette doesn’t mind her situation, why should I? People have different lifestyles. Some of them I would never consider for myself, but if the people living them are happy, who am I and who is anyone else to judge?

Originally a script for a video review, so some parts may stick out and, without visual aids, I recommend having played the game already! Note: this is for the originalTales of Symphonia, so if anything changed in the re-release, I haven’t touched on it here.

Oh, right. “I just believe” isn’t too terrible a response. We all believe in at least a few things we haven’t seen firsthand.

caption: dark matter, string theory, human rights and other Platonic notions of justice or goodness, parallel universes, life on other planets, life at ocean depths that haven’t been visited, animals you’ve never seen, countries you’ve never traveled to, the laws of physics remaining constant tomorrow

And I’ll give credit for not pulling out Pascal’s Wager.

No, not that Pascal. Wrong Tales game!

caption briefly flashed; people will have to pause if they want to read it: In all seriousness, while Pascal’s Wager may be a poor reason for Christian faith because of the specifics of our faith, namely that “I’ll believe just in case lulz” arguably isn’t a belief, it’s a pretty handy tool for probabilistic utilitarians in the tangible world. I don’t know for sure if lead-based paint, cell phone signals, sulfates in shampoo, aspartame in soda, or fluoridated water are harmful or if microwaves really so supercharge the particles inside food that our bodies’ defense systems cease to recognize them as food and begin attacking them like poison or something. I just ask myself what it would cost me to avoid them all and the answer was “not much,” so I kept microwave popcorn and tossed out everything else. No more philosophy in the rest of the videos, promise!

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7) It’s Bunglers All The Way Down

The party leaves Palmacosta again, but in their absence, Chocolat’s taken to a human ranch. Everyone agrees to save her, but first they run into the ninja girl again, praying in a church. She gets huffy and flustered while Lloyd and mostly Colette disarm her with kindness and get her name, Sheena, until she can’t take any more happy power and smoke bombs out again. (Caption: Hopeless Characters: 1)

Now off to the ranch. The Governor’s assistant warns everyone they’ve been led into a trap, so Kratos and Raine want to ditch Chocolat and go save the world. Colette vetoes them because she’s the Chosen, and the assistant wants in too. Even though he can’t fight [Hopeless Characters: 2], Lloyd’s like yeah, sure, because no one knows as much as him about being told you’re worthless.